Inhibition, but Not Excitation, Recovers From Partial Cone Loss With Greater Spatiotemporal Integration, Synapse Density and Frequency

Neural circuits function in the face of changing inputs, either caused by normal variation stimuli or cell death. To maintain their ability to perform essential computations with partial neural make modifications. Here, we study retinal circuit’s responses changes light photoreceptor inputs inducing cone death mature mouse retina. Can retina withstand recover from input loss? We find that excitatory pathways exhibit functional loss commensurate and some aspects predicted stimulation. However, Inhibitory functionally lost increasing spatiotemporal integration a way is not recapitulated partially stimulating control Anatomically, inhibitory synapses are upregulated on secondary bipolar cells output ganglion cells. These findings demonstrate greater capacity for inhibition, compared excitation, modify processing fewer inputs.